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SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids
 
Solar wind
speed: 444.0 km/sec
density: 12.0 protons/cm3
more data: ACE, DSCOVR
Updated: Today at 2351 UT
X-ray Solar Flares
6-hr max: B2
1959 UT Aug01
24-hr: C1
0747 UT Aug01
explanation | more data
Updated: Today at: 2300 UT
Daily Sun: 01 Aug 17
The sun is blank--no sunspots. This could soon change, however, because old sunspot AR2665 is poised to return to the Earthside of the sun. Credit: SDO/HMI

Sunspot number: 0
What is the sunspot number?
Updated 01 Aug 2017

Spotless Days
Current Stretch: 1 day
2017 total: 55 days (25%)
2016 total: 32 days (9%)
2015 total: 0 days (0%)

2014 total: 1 day (<1%)
2013 total: 0 days (0%)
2012 total: 0 days (0%)
2011 total: 2 days (<1%)
2010 total: 51 days (14%)
2009 total: 260 days (71%)

Updated 31 Jul 2017


The Radio Sun
10.7 cm flux: 70 sfu
explanation | more data
Updated 31 Jul 2017

Current Auroral Oval:
Switch to: Europe, USA, New Zealand, Antarctica
Credit: NOAA/Ovation
Planetary K-index
Now: Kp= 1 quiet
24-hr max: Kp= 3
quiet
explanation | more data
Interplanetary Mag. Field
Btotal: 7.8 nT
Bz: 2.2 nT north
more data: ACE, DSCOVR
Updated: Today at 2351 UT
Coronal Holes: 01 Aug 17

Solar wind flowing from this coronal hole is late reaching Earth and might be flowing mostly south of our planet. Credit: NASA/SDO.
Noctilucent Clouds They're back! Images of noctilucent clouds from NASA's AIM spacecraft are available again. The spacecraft's orbit had recently changed, requiring a new way to point AIM's science instruments. This problem has now been solved, and "daily daisies" have returned to Spaceweather.com.
Switch view: Europe, USA, Asia, Polar
Updated at: 08-01-2017 15:55:03
SPACE WEATHER
NOAA Forecasts
Updated at: 2017 Aug 01 2200 UTC
FLARE
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
CLASS M
20 %
20 %
CLASS X
01 %
01 %
Geomagnetic Storms:
Probabilities for significant disturbances in Earth's magnetic field are given for three activity levels: active, minor storm, severe storm
Updated at: 2017 Aug 01 2200 UTC
Mid-latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
15 %
10 %
MINOR
05 %
05 %
SEVERE
01 %
01 %
High latitudes
0-24 hr
24-48 hr
ACTIVE
15 %
15 %
MINOR
25 %
20 %
SEVERE
25 %
10 %
 
Tuesday, Aug. 1, 2017
What's up in space
       
 

Lights Over lapland is excited to announce that Autumn Aurora Adventures are available for immediate booking! Reserve your adventure of a lifetime in Abisko National Park, Sweden today!

 

SOLAR ECLIPSE, A NATIONAL DISASTER? Port-a-potty shortages. Cellular blackout zones. Ambulances stuck in gridlock. These are the conditions emergency managers across the USA are expecting the week of August 21 when millions of people converge on the narrow path of totality of the Great American Solar Eclipse. Get the full story from Newsweek.

THE PERSEID METEOR SHOWER BEGINS NOW: This week, Earth is entering a stream of debris from huge comet 109P/Swift/Tuttle, source of the annual Perseid meteor shower. Specks of dusty debris hitting the top of Earth's atmosphere at 110,000 mph are burning up in the night sky, producing a spray of shooting stars from the constellation Perseus. On July 31st James W. Young photographed a green Perseid fireball skimming the coast off Cannon Beach in western Oregon:

"The Needles (rock outcroppings) to the right are just south of Haystack Rock," says Young. "The fireball was a pleasant surprise!"

In the last three nights (July 30-Aug. 1), NASA cameras have detected more than 2 dozen Perseid fireballs streaking over the USA. These numbers are small, however, compared to what is in store. Forecasters expect Perseid meteor rates to increase 10-fold as Earth plunges deeper into the comet debris stream.  By the time the shower peaks on Aug. 11th-13th, sky watchers could see dozens of Perseids per hour despite the interfering glare of a bright gibbous Moon. Sprawl out in a moon shadow between midnight and dawn and enjoy the show! Sky maps: Aug. 11, 12, 13. Free: Meteor Alerts

Realtime Space Weather Photo Gallery

SOLAR ECLIPSE VIEWING GLASSES: Get ready for the Great American Solar Eclipse on Aug. 21st! Earth to Sky's safe solar glasses will allow you to view any phase of the upcoming eclipse without fear of damage to your eyes. The Family Pack includes 3 pairs of glasses and costs only $29.95. And there's a bonus. They have all been to the edge of space:

On June 23, 2017, the students of Earth to Sky Calculus flew a payload-full of solar glasses to the stratosphere onboard a high-altitude space weather balloon. The glasses ascended more than 95,000 feet above the Sierra Nevada mountains of central California before parachuting back to Earth.

Each Family Pack of solar eclipse glasses comes with a unique gift card showing the glasses floating at the top of Earth's atmosphere. The interior of the card tells the story of the flight and confirms that these items have been to the edge of space and back again.

More items from the edge of space may be found in the Earth to Sky Store. All proceeds support our Solar Eclipse Balloon Network and hands-on STEM education.

Far Out Gifts: Earth to Sky Store
All proceeds support hands-on STEM education

QUARTER MOON, QUARTER EARTH: On July 30th, photographer Peter Lowenstein of Mutare, Zimbabwe, was outside at the exact moment of the First Quarter Moon (15.23 UT) and he took its picture. "The terminator between lunar day and night was so straight, it made me wonder, how did the Earth look from the Moon at the same instant?" Here is the answer:

"I combined my moonshot with a Fourmilab simulation of the Earth as viewed from the Moon at the same time," he says. "The illumination on the First Quarter Moon viewed from Earth is the same as that on the Last Quarter Earth viewed from the Moon."

Fun activity: Use the Fourmilab simulator to view the Earth from the Moon during the Perseid meteor shower on August 12th and the Great American Solar Eclipse on August 21st. Warning, this activity can be addictive.

Realtime Noctilucent Cloud Photo Gallery


Realtime Meteor Photo Gallery


Realtime Aurora Photo Gallery

  All Sky Fireball Network
Every night, a network of NASA all-sky cameras scans the skies above the United States for meteoritic fireballs. Automated software maintained by NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office calculates their orbits, velocity, penetration depth in Earth's atmosphere and many other characteristics. Daily results are presented here on Spaceweather.com.

On Aug. 1, 2017, the network reported 72 fireballs.
(43 sporadics, 11 Perseid, 8 Southern delta Aquariids, 8 alpha Capricornids, 1 Northern delta Aquariid, 1 Piscis Austrinid)

In this diagram of the inner solar system, all of the fireball orbits intersect at a single point--Earth. The orbits are color-coded by velocity, from slow (red) to fast (blue). [Larger image] [movies]

  Near Earth Asteroids
Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs) are space rocks larger than approximately 100m that can come closer to Earth than 0.05 AU. None of the known PHAs is on a collision course with our planet, although astronomers are finding new ones all the time.
On August 1, 2017 there were 1803 potentially hazardous asteroids.
Recent & Upcoming Earth-asteroid encounters:
Asteroid
Date(UT)
Miss Distance
Velocity (km/s)
Diameter (m)
2011 CC22
2017-Aug-04
15.5 LD
18.4
186
2017 NB7
2017-Aug-06
6.9 LD
6
80
2017 OF7
2017-Aug-10
19.2 LD
8.1
88
2014 OA339
2017-Aug-13
12.3 LD
10
47
3122
2017-Sep-01
18.5 LD
13.5
5376
2014 RC
2017-Sep-11
15.1 LD
8.9
16
1989 VB
2017-Sep-29
7.9 LD
6.3
408
Notes: LD means "Lunar Distance." 1 LD = 384,401 km, the distance between Earth and the Moon. 1 LD also equals 0.00256 AU. MAG is the visual magnitude of the asteroid on the date of closest approach.
  Cosmic Rays in the Atmosphere

Readers, thank you for your patience while we continue to develop this new section of Spaceweather.com. We've been working to streamline our data reduction, allowing us to post results from balloon flights much more rapidly, and we have developed a new data product, shown here:

This plot displays radiation measurements not only in the stratosphere, but also at aviation altitudes. Dose rates are expessed as multiples of sea level. For instance, we see that boarding a plane that flies at 25,000 feet exposes passengers to dose rates ~10x higher than sea level. At 40,000 feet, the multiplier is closer to 50x. These measurements are made by our usual cosmic ray payload as it passes through aviation altitudes en route to the stratosphere over California.

What is this all about? Approximately once a week, Spaceweather.com and the students of Earth to Sky Calculus fly space weather balloons to the stratosphere over California. These balloons are equipped with radiation sensors that detect cosmic rays, a surprisingly "down to Earth" form of space weather. Cosmic rays can seed clouds, trigger lightning, and penetrate commercial airplanes. Furthermore, there are studies ( #1, #2, #3, #4) linking cosmic rays with cardiac arrhythmias and sudden cardiac death in the general population. Our latest measurements show that cosmic rays are intensifying, with an increase of more than 13% since 2015:


Why are cosmic rays intensifying? The main reason is the sun. Solar storm clouds such as coronal mass ejections (CMEs) sweep aside cosmic rays when they pass by Earth. During Solar Maximum, CMEs are abundant and cosmic rays are held at bay. Now, however, the solar cycle is swinging toward Solar Minimum, allowing cosmic rays to return. Another reason could be the weakening of Earth's magnetic field, which helps protect us from deep-space radiation.

The radiation sensors onboard our helium balloons detect X-rays and gamma-rays in the energy range 10 keV to 20 MeV. These energies span the range of medical X-ray machines and airport security scanners.

The data points in the graph above correspond to the peak of the Reneger-Pfotzer maximum, which lies about 67,000 feet above central California. When cosmic rays crash into Earth's atmosphere, they produce a spray of secondary particles that is most intense at the entrance to the stratosphere. Physicists Eric Reneger and Georg Pfotzer discovered the maximum using balloons in the 1930s and it is what we are measuring today.

  Essential web links
NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center
  The official U.S. government space weather bureau
Atmospheric Optics
  The first place to look for information about sundogs, pillars, rainbows and related phenomena.
Solar Dynamics Observatory
  Researchers call it a "Hubble for the sun." SDO is the most advanced solar observatory ever.
STEREO
  3D views of the sun from NASA's Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory
Solar and Heliospheric Observatory
  Realtime and archival images of the Sun from SOHO.
Daily Sunspot Summaries
  from the NOAA Space Environment Center
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NOAA 27-Day Space Weather Forecasts
  fun to read, but should be taken with a grain of salt! Forecasts looking ahead more than a few days are often wrong.
Aurora 30 min forecast
  from the NOAA Space Environment Center
Heliophysics
  the underlying science of space weather
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